


paper girls play with pearls (she's got your number now)

by Thegaygumballmachine



Category: Major Crimes (TV), The Closer
Genre: F/F, I'm Bad At Tagging, Phone Sex, avocados as supporting characters, brenda just wants lOVE, brenda still not understanding california, domestic!! lesbians!!, guilty!brenda, kate Not Tagging For Info (again), kind of, sharon is so put together its intimidating (again), sort of a mess, theyve moved in together and rusty doesnt exist i dont even give half a fuck, this is so very far from canon compliant i honestly dont even know what to tell you, toothpaste banter (?????)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-07-31 12:00:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20114764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thegaygumballmachine/pseuds/Thegaygumballmachine
Summary: “What do you need an avocado for, anyway? Is this a California thing?”





	paper girls play with pearls (she's got your number now)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so excited to start writing for this fandom, you have no idea. This is the most fun I've had writing something in a very long time. 
> 
> Sort of AU. Set around season 1-2 of major crimes, I think. I can't possibly see Brenda enjoying working at the DA's office, so let's just happily ignore that altogether.
> 
> (I don't own them, nor profit from them. Just borrowing them for a bit and making them really gay.)
> 
> For Katelyn.

There’s a reason Brenda isn’t usually the one to do the groceries.

Sharon is so meticulous with her list making that everything they could possibly need and more is accounted for, written out in her tight, clean script along the cheesy, Halloween themed notepad they still have yet to get rid of. It’s all right there, clear and obvious, and Brenda trusts that, reads it over maybe ten times before checkout. 

Regardless, she’s halfway home before she realizes she’s forgotten toothpaste and basil, while also _somehow _having picked up two extra chocolate bars and a bag of mini Reese’s cups. 

The latter is a transgression Sharon will easily forgive, but Brenda worries over the former, tears up her lip all the way to the parking lot and then some. The best case scenario is a pat on the shoulder and “I’ll go at the weekend,” but there’s also the equally probable “you should’ve just let me do it,” which will not only make Brenda feel useless but also, again, as if this is Sharon’s home, and she’s just living in it. 

“I’ll call her, okay,” she mutters to herself, shrugging the bags up her arms. “Will that make you happy?”

It requires more dexterity than she thought it might, balancing the phone and her keys and three bags of groceries to boot, and she barely registers how long it rings through for, starts to give up on it. 

This is all still so new to her, coexisting with someone like Sharon. There’s this constant pressure to be on top of everything, one Sharon actively tries to diffuse, but she never actually manages that and Brenda still feels like she has to prove herself at every turn or risk getting thrown out. 

(At least she recognizes how irrational she is, understands it fully and accepts how it sounds.)

Coincidentally, it’s the very moment she finally manages to fit the key into the lock that a clipped _ Captain Raydor _filters through the line. It makes her smile, that serendipity, and she puts the phone on speaker as she sets about getting the bags onto counters and her coat into the closet. 

“Hey,” she shouts, stocks the fridge with bacon, cheese and eggs and, really, it’s a vegan’s nightmare in there, but it’s not something she can help with both their diets combined. “It’s me.”

“Brenda? I didn’t expect to hear from you today.”

“Yeah, well, I’m just full of surprises.”

This she says as she unloads pasta and peanut butter into the nearest cabinet, debates where to put the avocados before sticking them to the back of the countertop. There are tomatoes too, and an onion of each color, but those she thinks are supposed to go in the crisper, though she isn’t particularly sure about it. 

“What do you need an avocado for, anyway? Is this a California thing?”

Sharon laughs, but the question is genuine; she ponders it while rescuing the bag of Reese’s and eating about seven straight from it, turning to look at the rest of the apartment in its apparent stillness. She may have lived here long enough to know the street names, but there are some things she doesn’t think she’ll ever understand. 

“Goes well with eggs,” says Sharon, absently. “Was there something you wanted?”

“Just to hear your voice,” says Brenda, sweet as she can possibly make a lie, and puts the phone back to her ear, peels an orange to abate her guilt. “I miss you.”

There’s a stretch of quiet, not peaceful but not actively hostile either, and Brenda eats two slices of the orange to fill the time, even though it’s too tart for her and leaves her with a terrible aftertaste. 

“I miss you too, Brenda Leigh.”

She releases a breath she didn’t think to be holding, and it’s like there was something pressing on her chest that’s gone with those very particular six words. It’s something new altogether to be so wanted while also feeling free in her space. 

“Any chance of you comin’ home early?”

“You know there isn’t.”

“Well, least now I can say I tried.”

The last of the groceries are quick; she’s seen Sharon do this enough times that it’s almost like muscle memory, and it’s all neat enough that she could convince herself to be proud of it. 

“How long do you have,” she asks, finally — she’s been putting it off, hoping if she didn’t ask it would never come up and they could keep the conversation on until Sharon left to come home. She drags her feet to the bedroom, stops in the doorway to hear the answer. 

“I don’t have anything pressing to deal with right now,” says Sharon, surprisingly. “I’m all yours unless we catch a case.”

“Now that,” says Brenda, “is just _ lovely_.”

——

It’s odd, not having much to do at this hour. It isn’t quite bad, but something about it feels intrinsically wrong. Brenda Leigh Johnson should not be lying about in bed at three in the afternoon, and yet here she is, rumpling the sheets up and chatting to her lover about nothing at all while most everyone else works through.

(She doesn’t think she could ever get used to a life of leisure, but she likes a month of it just fine.

Sharon’s been saying she looks relaxed, and she doesn’t think anyone’s ever said that about her, not in all her life.)

She’s talking about something to do with work just now, and Brenda is listening to the best of her ability but her mind is prone to wander when she’s this warm and this comfortable and she can’t help but fixate on their goodbye kiss this morning, how Sharon had pulled her in twice more than she should have, clung to her like a woman starved. 

“Provenza told me about it,” Sharon is saying, and Brenda grimaces, shakes her head of that. 

“Do _ not _talk to me about Provenza.”

“Is there something else you’d prefer?”

And Brenda hopes to all hell she isn’t misreading the flirtation there, the little purr in the breath. She licks her lips, turns onto her side to press patterns into the sheet with her forefinger. 

“What are you wearin’?”

She asks before she can think about it, and the thread of the previous conversation unravels instantly. There’s a smirk in her voice, a drawl in the vowels. She’s stretched out like a cat now, luxuriating in the softness of Sharon’s mattress, the little patch of reflected sunshine that seems just for her. 

“The same thing I was when you saw me this morning,” says Sharon, deliberately slowly. Brenda huffs, sits up on her elbow for the full picture of affront. 

“You’re no fun,” she gripes, blows a curl of hair from her face. Sharon laughs at that, one of her slow, dry chuckles that feels like a slick of heat down Brenda’s spine. 

There’s a pause, a thick one, one that raises goosebumps on Brenda’s arms. She faintly hears paper shifting, what might be the scratch of a pen. 

“The green satin set.”

This comes much quieter than anything else, almost as if she’s afraid to say it, even in the relative privacy of her own office. There’s a huskiness there too, a depth, and Brenda can just see that, can easily picture her atop the desk with her blouse half undone and a mix of red and pink across her mouth. She falls back again, cups her neck with her free hand. 

“Ooh, yum. Did you pick that out just for me?”

“That’s entirely possible,” Sharon says, and now it’s her with the smirk in her tone, a light smugness that Brenda can pair to an expression with little work at all. “And the nylons you like.”

“Good lord, Shar, you’re killin’ me.”

Absently, Brenda trails a finger down her neck and across her collarbone, light, gentle touches. After a moment’s indecision, she allows her eyes to flutter shut, the smile to fade from her lips. 

“I hadn’t noticed,” says Sharon, wry and offhand. Brenda lets her breath hitch right into the mic and bites her lip when Sharon’s follows suit. 

“You’re alone, right?”

“Yes.”

It’s tentative, and directly on its heels;

“But… Brenda, anyone could come in at any time. I’ll be home in a few hours.”

“Guess I’ll have to do the talkin’ then,” says Brenda. 

“This is _ completely _inappropriate,” says Sharon, but there’s a certain resignation to it, like she knows Brenda doesn’t quite care.

“You bet,” she whispers, laced with a giggle, and Sharon sighs, put upon as ever, but does not protest further. Brenda takes that as it is, puts the phone back on speaker and sets about shrugging her top over her head. 

“I’ve been thinkin’ about you,” she says. 

“What about me?”

“Your hair. And your hands.”

Sharon hums her acknowledgement and Brenda resumes her teasing touches, skimming up and over the bra but never quite giving in. She thinks on what to say next, how to deliver it for maximum impact, but the thought gets away from her when she lingers a little too long and what comes out instead is “_God, _I just love your hands.”

“I bet you do,” says Sharon, and she clearly tries to conceal the way it shakes, but Brenda knows, moans with it. She pulls down the right cup and tweaks, just hard enough to hurt, grinds her hips down into the mattress with an exaggerated whimper that's mostly for Sharon’s benefit.

Sharon, for her part, only coughs. There’s a gasp in there somewhere, harsh with want, but it covers well. She adjusts something that seems to shuffle, huffs a tiny breath. The background noise goes static and there’s a soft squeak, like old metal being forced into movement.

“_Brenda._”

“Sharon.”

It’s not quite a mirror of Sharon’s tone in that it’s much more of a moan than that, the end of the word bleeding into a hum. She can hear the unsteady rhythm of Sharon’s breath, how she’s struggling to right it, and flushes with power. 

“Give me an hour and a half,” Sharon says. It’s pleading, in her way, low and silky like she only ever is in moments like this. “Just an hour and a half, and then I will be there, _ with you, _ and I will fuck you however you want, wherever you want, until you can hardly even _ speak_.”

Brenda blinks, sits up, and tries to weigh her options. 

(Really, the decision’s already made.)

“Sounds great,” she says. It’s a little thready, a little raw, but all of that will keep. 

“Good. Alright. Um… I’ll call you back.”

“No need.”

The sound of their breathing mingles together, and there’s a strange comfort in that, something bone deep. Sharon says a stilted goodbye, and Brenda laughs a little, low in her throat. 

“By the way,” she says, just before she hangs up, “I forgot to get toothpaste.”


End file.
